MISSING: The State Department Emails of Hillary Clinton’s Computer Guy

Remember Bryan Pagliano? He’s the senior Hillary Clinton IT guy who worked for her at State, and on her home server. When Pagliano was called to testify before the Benghazi committee he “took the fifth.” The latest Pagliano-related issue is that his State Department emails seem to have disappeared. Well not all of them are missing, just the ones written during Ms. Clinton’s tenure at Foggy Bottom.

Politico is reporting that State Dept. officials told the Senate Judiciary Committee in a recent closed-door meeting that they could not locate what’s known as a “.pst file” for Pagliano’s work during Clinton’s tenure, which would have included copies of the tech expert’s emails, according to a letter Chairman Chuck Grassley sent to Secretary of State John Kerry (embedded below).

A personal storage table or .pst is an open file format used to store copies of messages, calendar events, and other items within Microsoft software such as Microsoft Exchange Client, Windows Messaging, and Microsoft Outlook.

The department also told the committee the FBI has taken possession of Pagliano’s government computer system, where traces of the messages are most likely to be found, according to the letter.

Grassley, an Iowa Republican, has been considering whether to grant Pagliano immunity in exchange for testimony on who approved Clinton’s private email setup and whether anyone raised any objections to the system. The controversy over her decision to bypass a government email address, which would have made her messages easier for reporters and the public to obtain, has dogged the presidential hopeful for much of the year, though it has subsided in recent weeks.

Pagliano — who worked for Clinton’s 2008 presidential campaign, then followed her to the State Department — has refused to discuss Clinton’s email arrangement or his role in it, invoking his right against self-incrimination before the House Benghazi Committee earlier this fall.

Clinton had personally paid Pagliano to maintain her home-made server, which is also currently in the FBI’s possession. The agency has been investigating whether classified material was ever put at risk because she used her own server instead of the standard State email system.

Per the letter Grassley requested Pagliano’s emails to aid him in deciding decision whether to grant the IT guy immunity.

“Given that the committee is unable to obtain [Pagliano’s] testimony at this time, I am seeking copies of his official State Department emails relevant to the Committee’s inquiry before proceeding to consider whether it might be appropriate to grant him immunity and compel his testimony,”

Politico reports (not surprisingly) while it has located a backup for emails Pagliano sent after Clinton left State, officials cannot find the file for the backup covering work he did while she was still there.

“The Department has located a .pst from Mr. Pagliano’s recent work at the Department as a contractor, but the files are from after Secretary Clinton left the State Department. We have not yet located a .pst that covers the time period of Secretary Clinton’s tenure,” said Alec Gerlach, a State Department spokesman. “We are continuing to search for Mr. Pagliano’s emails which the Department may have otherwise retained. We will, of course, share emails responsive to Senator Grassley’s requests if we locate them.”

Isn’t it strange how that happens? And only with the emails needed to finish off the Benghazi investigation. Now if I was a cynical man, I would suggest that the .pst files were purposely lost as to protect Hillary Clinton. But that couldn’t happen in the most transparent administration in the history of the entire universe.